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Your #Career : The 10 Best Sites For Finding An Internship In 2016… Question: What’s the Best Way in Attaining a Job when you Graduate from College? Answer: 96% Land Jobs thru Internships Before Graduation.

February 1, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

“Years ago, when I was in college, when I wanted to apply for internships, the only websites around were Monster and CareerBuilder,” says Lauren Berger. “I would go to those sites as a student and I would feel so lost. I just wanted someone to help me.”

Berger, now 31, wound up taking on 15 different internships in her student years before going on to found the internship search site Intern Queen, now in its seventh year and number 9 on our list of the best sites for finding internships. “I had this light bulb moment where I said, ‘Wait a second, what if I were the person that could help other students – at that time, my peers, and now students around the world – get one step closer to their dream opportunity.”

The fact is college students and new graduates have more resources for finding an internship than ever. In addition to the time-tested strategy of scouring their own networks of friends, family and contacts, young people in search of an entry-level position or valuable experience in the workplace have many quality search engines to look through. Here are ten of the best:

LinkedIn

The ubiquity of LinkedIn in the world of professional networking is so profound, having a profile there is arguably more important than having a presence on any other social media site. Building a network of contacts is easy, and connecting with friends adds a social aspect to the massive, international online job fair LinkedIn has become. Keep in mind, though, that the cost to post a single job is $499 for employers (it costs $295 each to post ten of them), so the internship listings you turn up will likely have been placed by firms with a few dollars to throw around. For opportunities at smaller, more thrifty firms, look elsewhere.

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Indeed

Indeed.com’s low cost model has served it well since its founding in 2004; its policy of letting employers post jobs and search resumes for free may be the prime factor in the site’s ability to attract the 180 million unique visitors it claims log on every month from over 50 different countries. The plain mechanics of the site provide a no-nonsense search engine that’s easy to navigate for those seeking or posting jobs. A search for internship positions in Chicago, yielded almost 2,000 results, with the option to whittle down the list of findings by salary, distance, company and job type. Results also show reviews of employers, presumably written by previous employees.

Internships.com

Based in Burbank, California, Internships.com is owned by textbook rental and educational services company Chegg and claims to offer 143,000 positions from 94,000 companies in 8,270 cities in the U.S. A quick search for internships in advertising in the Chicago area yielded 220 results, the vast majority of them virtual positions, workable from remote locations. The service offers free postings, allows users to see which Facebook FB +1.75% friends are connected to a given company and, of course, includes a mobile app for managing a job search on the go.

Glassdoor

Based in Sausalito, California, Glassdoor boasts useful ratings of various aspects of employing companies, including CEO approval ratings, salary reports, interview reviews and questions, and benefit information. The company also offers a mobile app. A quick search for an internship in advertising near Chicago yielded 329 postings, though some of them had already expired.

Your School or Alma Mater

The careers website of the college you attended can be a fantastic resource if you’re seeking an internship for the summer or looking for entry into the workforce in a given industry. Different schools within a university sometimes have their own job boards too. If employers trust the university you attended enough to seek its students as workers, you will be at an advantage as a product of that institution.

Idealist

Founded in 1995, Idealist.org focuses on finding job seekers positions as volunteers, opportunities at non profits, and open internships. The firm, which is based in New York City and Portland, Oregon, boasts 1.4 million visitors to its site and placement openings with over 100,000 organizations. A quick search conducted in late January for internships – in no particular geographical region – yielded just fewer than 1,900 openings. Founder Ami Dar sat down with Forbes contributor Rahim Kanini in 2012; see that interview here.

Absolute Internship

Since it was launched in 2009 by Fredrik van Huynh, London-based Absolute Internship has focused on the internationally-minded internship seeker. As van Huynh told FORBES, the company is sought out by “ambitious, travel-loving university students who are keen on expanding their global network and want to meet students from around the world.” Van Huynh claims the firm places about 1,000 students each year into internships in its six locations—Beijing, Hong Kong, London, Madrid, Shanghai and Singapore. Students pay a program fee that starts at $3,099 and goes up to $6,495 for the destination they have been accepted to.

Looksharp

Since launching for business in 2009, Looksharp – which, once upon a time, was known as InternMatch – has raised almost $9.5 million from players like 500 Startups, Artis Ventures and Kapor Capital, to name a few. The company claims to offer postings from over 30,000 companies including Facebook , Lyft , Vertafore , and Charles Schwab , plus quite a few NGOs. The search engine stores positions from most U.S. states, Washington, D.C., plus some areas of Canada. When searching, if the internship you had your sights on is no longer available, Looksharp will offer up several others that are similar.

Intern Queen

Lauren Berger’s Intern Queen business has been around for the past seven years and emerged directly from her own experience searching for internships. Her small staff, based in California, seeks to give internship seekers a slightly more personal service by offering career and job search advice on its site while putting forth its founder, Berger, as the very visible face of the media and fashion industry-centric search organization. Says Berger: “I think people come to our site and feel like they have a cheerleader; someone really rooting for them and there to hold their hand throughout the internship journey.”

Internship Programs

Internship Programs is essentially a landing page for a bevy of internship openings from everywhere. The simple site allows job-seekers to type in a keyword describing what they are looking for, followed by a geographical location in which they would like to work. The results are often brief descriptions of what’s on offer and a link to the hiring company’s site or the job board on which the position is offered.

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Forbes.com | February 1, 2016 | Karsten Strauss

Your #Career : The Top 6 Things You Should Never Tolerate In Your Career…If you Think you Have to Compromise on Any of the These in Order to be Employed or Build a Successful Career, I Hope this Article will Get you to Think Again.

January 31, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

People mistakenly believe that in these tough economic times they have to give up on their values and integrity to stay employed, but that’s simply not true. Those who are guided by a strong sense of integrity fare much better in professional life, and will be successful where others fail.

Before launching my own coaching firm, I spent 18 years in corporate life, in publishing, marketing and membership services. I rose to the level of VP, and managed global initiatives, sizable staffs and multimillion-dollar budgets. Some of it was fulfilling, and I was considered “successful.” But much of it, especially at the end, was not good, healthy, positive or rewarding. In fact, the last few years of corporate work were full of toxicity. From backstabbing colleagues, to substandard leadership, to unethical practices, there were things I witnessed and participated in that, today, I would never, for a second, tolerate or accept. I’ve grown up.

In my career coaching work over 10,000 professionals in 10 years, I see every day in their lives and careers these same challenges repeated over and over – that they’ve compromised themselves and their integrity to get a paycheck, to keep a job, to be promoted, or to achieve what they think is success or financial “security.” And it’s making them depressed, ill and disillusioned. But six of these challenges rise to the top as the most egregious and damaging.

Here are the top 6 things you should never tolerate in your work or career.

1- Allowing someone to abuse or harass you

There was one experience I faced in my corporate life that could only be called sexual harassment. One executive two levels above me made personal, sexually inappropriate requests and suggestions to me that made me terribly uncomfortable, and were way beyond acceptable. The implication was that if I did what he suggested, he would favor me and send important, lucrative business my way (worth millions).

It was one of the toughest periods of my professional life because I simply had no idea how to successfully navigate through it. If I said “no” to him, my business (and I) would be hurt, as he was known to make life difficult for people who didn’t do what he said. If I complained to HR (whom I didn’t trust), I would be hurt there too, because he was deeply ensconced in the company and wouldn’t be reprimanded. In the end I declined his suggestions, but I’ll never forget how victimized and trapped I felt.

What to do instead? Never allow someone to abuse or harass you. Ever. Get outside help immediately if this happens, and obtain the expert support and guidance you need to help you navigate through these challenges with the help of someone with power and authority in your corner.

What are you tolerating that you’re ready to say “no” to?

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2- Giving up everything for money

Money – and our relationship with it — is a topic that’s spawned millions of books, articles and seminars. Many struggle each day with maintaining a healthy balance and appropriate power dynamic with money, and many fail. Countless professionals give up their souls for money – not because they are necessarily struggling to pay the bills, but often because they’ve become enslaved by their lifestyle and the need to impress (and their need to feed their sense of worthiness through money). These folks have forgotten what they’re capable of, and that they’re here at this time not to just pay the bills, acquire things, and keep up with the Joneses. I’m not saying that fulfilling your financial obligations isn’t important – it is. I am saying that you are much more than your paycheck or bank account. And you can find work that both feeds your soul AND brings you the money you need.

What to do instead? Get out of denial and recognize when you’ve sacrificed your soul for money. It’s clear when it’s happened – you’re in a painful, debilitating state that you can’t ignore, and no amount of money will heal it. (Here’s more about transforming your wealth programming.)

3- Abandoning your self-respect

Recently, a client of mine shared this:

“I’m feeling so much pressure to be the kind of manager and leader I dislike intensely. I’m not allowed to spend my time developing people, or to give them the training and help I want to give them, to support their growth. I’m told I have to manage and behave in a certain way that feels really wrong for me, and I just don’t know what to do about it. When I push for what I believe is right, I’m either ignored, shut down, or I’m not considered a team player. I don’t like who I’ve become here.”

I’ve lived this too – that the way I was expected to behave, communicate and act in a certain corporate culture – as a manager or a leader – made me lose all self-respect.

What to do instead? If you feel that you’ve lost your self-respect, you need to make some significant shifts in how you are operating in the world and what you’re allowing. Often we’re in this situation because we don’t understand the tremendous value we offer, or the great talents and skills we possess. We see only what’s at the tip of our nose, and not the bigger picture of who we are and can be in the working world. If this resonates with you, you’ll need to learn how to honor yourself more deeply, and adhere to what you believe and know. If you can’t do that in your current job, start interviewing and find a better job that’s a better fit. It’s doable but you have to start.

4- Lowering your standards of integrity

I view “standards of integrity” as core principles and values that guide our behavior. Integrity is a choice, and while it is influenced by a myriad of factors (your culture, upbringing, peer influences, etc.), if you behave in ways that are out of alignment with your integrity, you’ll suffer. One who has strong and well-defined standards of integrity behaves with wholeness, integration, honesty, and does right by himself/herself and by others. Standards of integrity involve values and virtues such as honesty, kindness, trust, wisdom, loyalty, transparency, objectivity, acceptance, openness, empathy, and graciousness.

In these past few years, I’ve witnessed so many people in midlife awaken as if from a deep sleep to realize that they’ve compromised their most core values in order to get ahead in their work or retain jobs they hate. It hurts them to realize that they’ve walked away from who they are, and what they value and cherish most.

What to do instead? Identify your top values (here’s a great values exercise, courtesy of the Connecticut Women’s Business Development Council) and begin to honor those more deeply in all the work you do. Move away from work and people who don’t align with your top values.

5- Disregarding your health and well-being

In my teleclasses and workshops, I see hundreds of high-level professional women who are brilliant, achievement-oriented and accomplished, but at the same time exhausted, depleted, and depressed. In the pursuit of a great career, they’ve compromised their health and well-being. Much of this has to do with the ever-complicated issue of work-life balance and how to stay competitive and ahead of the curve. But to me, it’s much more. Sacrificing your health and well-being demonstrates your lack of prioritizing yourself as important, failing to understand that you need to care and restore for yourself every day – and yes,put yourself first — before you can be of true service to anyone else, your business, your family or your employer. If your body is shutting down, diseased or debilitated because of how you work, rapid change is needed.

What to do instead? Find ways to be kinder and more caring to yourself, with behaviors you can sustain over time. Start putting yourself first rather than last. Read Gretchen Rubin’s great book Better Than Before to learn more about your personal tendencies that shape how you see the world, and how you can build healthier, life-nourishing habits that lead to a happier life.

6- Ignoring your life purpose

Finally, the saddest professionals I’ve met haven’t taken the time to uncover their passions, or identify what gives their life meaning and purpose. I’m continually stunned when, in my Amazing Career Project course, members share that they don’t have a clue what they’re passionate or even excited about in life. If you don’t know what you’re passionate about, or understand the amazing talents you possess that you can leverage to make a difference in the world, you simply can’t build a career that will bring joy and fulfillment.

What to do instead? Begin to think about what you’d like your legacy to be. What do you want to be able to say about yourself when you’re 90 years old looking back — what you’ve stood for, given, taught, imparted, and left behind. Not what you dreamed of being, but what you have been. Think about the impact you want to make – on your family, friends, community and the world.

In addition, think about what you do each day that you can’t not do, even when you’re not getting paid for it. (Thanks to Gretchen Rubin for reminding me of this yesterday). For me, for instance, I love to write, explore ideas, problem-solve, help others, learn about what makes humans tick, and use my voice in a public way (I’m a singer as well as a speaker). What you can’t NOT do is a clue to what gives your life juice, purpose and meaning.

So many professionals forget that they have this one chance to build a life that’s meaningful and purposeful for them. Instead, they compromise their potential impact and legacy in a vain effort to grasp “success,” accolades, security, or power. (If you want to clarify your own desired legacy, values, passions, standards of integrity and more, take my Career Path Self-Assessment).

* * * * *

If you think you have to compromise on any of the above in order to be employed or build a successful career, I hope you’ll think again. I’ve lived the pain of losing myself in the processing of building my professional life. I finally learned that, despite all our best efforts, you can never create the success, fulfillment and reward you long for if you to say “no” to who you really are.

What are you tolerating that you’re ready to say “no” to?

Forbes.com | January 30, 2016 | Kathy Caprino

Your #Career : Here’s What to Do When you Realize your Boss Secretly Hates You…There are Plenty of Obvious — & Not so Obvious — Signs your Boss Dislikes you. If you’re Getting the Sense That’s the Case, you’ll Want to Do Everything You Can to Turn Things Around.

January 30, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

“The relationship between you and your boss is likely the most important work relationship you can cultivate, so it’s worth spending intentional time and effort building trust and fostering a good relationship,” says Michael Kerr, an international business speaker and author of “The Humor Advantage.”

If your boss doesn’t like you, it can negatively affect almost every aspect of your work and your overall happiness. “You may be unfairly passed over for promotions or raises; miss out on important assignments; never receive fair feedback; or be subjected to an atmosphere of resentment and distrust ultimately leading to increased levels of stress that eventually force you to search for a new job. It can also reflect poorly on your performance reviews and mean that you miss out on getting a fair referral when you move on to another job,” Kerr explains.

But know that building trust and maintaining respect with your boss isn’t about being a “suck up” or “cloying sycophant,” he says. “It’s about earning their respect. It’s about being true to yourself and being authentic. And it’s not about becoming best buddies with your boss.”

Also keep in mind that there are terrible bosses out there who are bullies and rule through intimidation and fear. “In these cases, you may never win and you need to realize that the best thing you can do is to not compromise your own integrity and principles and move on to a better work situation,” Kerr says.

Here’s what to do if you think your boss secretly hates you:

Remember that disagreement is not the same as hatred.

Ask yourself if you truly believe your boss genuinely dislikes you, or if they simply don’t agree with all of your ideas.

If you’re fairly certain it’s the former, follow the steps below. But if it’s the latter, “try to embrace a difference of opinion with the idea that you’ll learn something, and do your best to not take the opposing side as a personal attack,” suggests Lynn Taylor, a national workplace expert and the author of “Tame Your Terrible Office Tyrant: How to Manage Childish Boss Behavior and Thrive in Your Job.”

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Get a reality check from others.

If you think you’re being singled out by your manager and are “hated,” check in with a trusted colleague who does like you to get their opinion. “They may tell you differently: that this is how the ‘culprit’ operates with everyone. Or, you may be vindicated, which gives you a green light to speak up,” says Taylor. “But be sure to keep the conversation between you and trusted colleague discreet.”

Be proactive.

It’s wise to check in with colleagues — but know that if you believe or feel in your gut that there’s a problem, there probably is, Taylor says.

“It doesn’t really matter whether your boss really likes you or not. If you’re sitting around worrying about the relationship and it’s affecting your productivity, then you should absolutely address it,” she explains. “And your instincts are probably right, anyway. Your boss may have too much on their plate to address the issue, so it behooves you to try and resolve it so you can produce stellar results. Discontentment festers — it won’t be solved by inertia and stalemate.”

Communicate directly and diplomatically.

Approach your boss, and be diplomatic but direct. Also try to choose a time you know your boss won’t be too stressed or rushed, Taylor suggests.

Kerr suggests addressing the situation head on. “Schedule a meeting in a neutral area where you can discuss your concerns calmly and professionally, always focusing on how you want to do what’s best for the company and what’s best for the team,” he says.

“Take the high road and ask if there’s things you could or should be doing differently and show your willingness to accept feedback and change if need be.”

Taylor says to use positive bookends in the beginning and end: “I really enjoy working here and with you. I want to do my best work and so, I want to share a concern I have. There have been times lately when I have felt X.”

“Use expressions such as ‘I have felt like’ and avoid terms such as ‘you’ which can feel accusatory,” she says. “End on a positive note, with a phrase such as, ‘Again, I want to thank you for taking the time to discuss this. I enjoy my projects. By the way, the Jones project did come through …'”

Schedule regular meetings.

Both Kerr and Taylor suggest scheduling regular face-to-face meetings with your boss, even if it’s only 15 minutes per week. “It’s essential that you maintain a regular connection with them and keep them up to date on your achievements,” Kerr says.

Manage up.

Sometimes it seems easier to give up than to approach a surly or bad boss, but with each small victory, you’ll feel more empowered, Taylor promises. “Managing up means being a proactive problem-solver, helping your boss see the big picture, being a role model, and using diplomacy and people skills, among other tools,” she says. “Managing up with a difficult boss is not just beneficial on the job; it’s a technique you’ll want to develop throughout your career.”

Ask them for ideas and input on things you are working on.

Ask in such a way that it doesn’t look as though you lack confidence, but with the goal of sending the message that you value and respect their opinion and truly want to give them a say in important projects you are working on, says Kerr.

Ask how you can improve or whether you’ve done anything wrong.

You may be doing everything right, but you’ll never know if you don’t ask.

If your boss is vague about their “issue” with you, try to press for specifics about what isn’t working, Taylor says. “If they seem unable to communicate it and have been in a passive aggressive mode, perhaps you have some ideas on what’s behind the problem, so you might try and bring up what you believe the underlying issues are.”

Express that you want to succeed in your role — and that you need your manager’s support to do so. If they feel they’re needed, it might help the situation.

Apologize.

If it turns our your boss doesn’t like you because of something you did — perhaps you once stole credit for their work, or you’ve thrown them under the bus — don’t get defensive and make excuses for your bad behavior. Own up to the mistake and say “sorry.”

“This will help you come across as more humble, open and honest,” says Kerr.

Don’t overreact or take things too personally.

The proverbial “count to ten” axiom is useful, says Taylor. “Take time to chill out and think things over before acting on an emotional whim. You may have misunderstood the person, and either or both of you may be holding an unnecessary grudge. Today, with heavy reliance on brief communications through texts, for example, there’s so much room for misunderstandings, and consequently office fall-outs. That makes emotional intelligence more critical than ever.”

Modify expectations.

Remember: You can’t (and won’t) be liked by everyone.

One easy way to be let down by your boss is to have high expectations that he or she wants to be lifelong friends, says Taylor. “There are cultural differences that make some people more extroverted than others, and a host of other reasons behind just how jovial your manager will be — none of which you can control.”

Offer your help.

Your job is already to make theirs easier — but it can’t hurt to ask if there’s anything else you can help with.

“Always ask your boss if there’s anything more you can do, or anything you can do to help make life easier for them,” Kerr suggests. “Actively demonstrate that you have your boss’s well-being and best interest at heart.” But be careful not to come off as a suck up.

Don’t try too hard.

Trying to hard may backfire, as it might come across as being insincere or even manipulative, Kerr warns.

“Yes, make an effort to be professional, friendly,and helpful. And yes, bringing treats from the local bakery or offering to grab your boss a coffee can help win them over. But be sincere and consistent about it. Laughing too hard at your boss’s lame joke, constantly apologizing, insincere flattery, or smothering your boss with attention can easily backfire.”

If all else fails, talk to HR.

Bullying behavior by your colleagues is not okay. It’s important for your own self-respect and contentment at work to let others know if and when they’ve overstepped the limits.

“You can do so by being polite but assertive, explaining your expectations,” says Taylor. “You don’t need this difficult person to be your friend, but you will need them to respect your boundaries of acceptable behavior.”

If they don’t respond and you see this behavior with others, you may discuss it with your boss’s boss or HR — but that should be a last resort.

Businessinsider.com | January 29, 2016 | Jacquelyn Smith

Your #Career : Work From Home In 2016: The Top 100 Companies For Remote Jobs…These Companies Clearly Understand that Integrating Telecommuters into their Workforce is a Smart Business Strategy. Remote Working is on the Rise, & this Acceleration is Great News for anyone Wishing to Trade the Office for a Telecommuting Job.

January 28, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

As technology gives us the freedom to work from anywhere, more and more people are prizing the ability to do so. Many companies are responding with flexible work schedules, and seeming to acknowledge the trend, the Department of Labor just announced that in 2017 it will resume its contingent workforce survey, which was last conducted in 2005.

FlexJobs, an online service devoted to listing telecommuting, flexible schedule, part-time and freelance work opportunities, is a prime resource for the segment of the workforce in search of such opportunities.

While one might find many spam emails or subway flyers promising work from home opportunities, FlexJobs offers up legitimate and professional listings for jobs in 50 career categories with positions ranging from entry-level to C-suite.

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The third annual list is based on an analysis of more than 40,000 companies and the jobs they posted on FlexJobs in 2015. (Check out the 2015 and 2014lists.)

Overall, the site saw a 36% increase in the number of remote listings, with computer and IT jobs topping the list of fields offering such opportunities, followed by medical and health, sales, administrative, customer service, education and training, and finally, marketing.

Some of the most popular telecommuting jobs included writer, engineer, marketing manager, healthcare consultant, case manager, development director and recruiter.

“These companies clearly understand that integrating telecommuters into their workforce is a smart business strategy,” said Sara Sutton Fell, founder and CEO of FlexJobs, in a statement. “Remote working is on the rise, and this acceleration is great news for anyone wishing to trade the office for a telecommuting job.”

Here’s the top 100 list, plus tips at the bottom on ways to make more money:

Forbes.com | January 27, 2016 | Laura Shin

Your #Career : 3 Ways to Deal With Job Search Anxiety…This Anxiety can Spill Over into the Interview Process & Cause you to Come Across as a Nervous Wreck who Doesn’t have the Right Skills for the Job.

January 27, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Searching for a new job can be an anxiety-provoking activity. This is especially true if you were suddenly laid off or fired. You likely feel pressure to find a job quickly so you can pay your bills and sustain your current level of living. However, this anxiety can spill over into the interview process and cause you to come across as a nervous wreck who doesn’t have the right skills for the job.

If you want to make a good first impression, you’ll need to get a handle on your anxiety. Here’s how.

1. Understand what’s happening

Psychologist James Pann says when faced with a stressful situation, our body goes into overdrive. We immediately enter into “panic mode,” and our body prepares to fight or run away from a perceived threat. Consequently, we may start to sweat, get the shakes, and feel our heart pounding before and during a job interview. Pann said:

When it is comes to networking, interviewing, and other stressful job search events, many of us experience at least some of these signs and symptoms. When faced with significant physical or psychological stress, your body reacts with what is termed the “fight or flight response.” The response prepares your body for physical action through sympathetic nervous system arousal and an increased release of corticoids, which are stress hormones. Virtually all the systems in your body are affected, including the circulatory, pulmonary, immune, and nervous systems. The physical symptoms associated with this state include quickened and shallow breathing, stomach disturbance, muscle tension and increased pulse rate.

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2. Visualize

Instead of worrying about everything that could go wrong during your interview, visualize a positive outcome. Imagine yourself making a great first impression and being offered the job. See yourself in a relaxed, happy state. If you can create a vision of yourself as confident and knowledgeable, you will appear more relaxed during your interview. It may also help to use a career vision board. One of the images could be a picture representing the job you want.

“By visualizing yourself as calm, using creative visualization techniques to relax, you can remove nagging anxiety, lower your blood pressure and overcome fears and phobias … If you’re lacking in self-belief and, for example, feel incapable of passing exams or overcoming obstacles in your life, you can call on creative visualization to strengthen your self-image and your belief in yourself. As you grow, you’ll naturally achieve the things you previously thought were impossible,” said author Robin Nixon.

3. Hire a career coach

A career coach can help you identify the right career track, polish interview skills, and offer resume advice. All you may need is a bit of coaching to push you in the right direction and ease your nerves.

“A coach gives you help tailored to you…and will help you develop new strategies and methods as you go along in the search…your coach is your personal sounding board and part of your unofficial board of directors,” said career development coach Joanne Meehl.

However, if you find that your anxiety is overwhelming and is starting to negatively affect other areas of your life, you may also want to talk to a mental health professional. Your difficulties could partly be due to an underlying anxiety disorder.

CheatSheet.com | Januray 26, 2016 | Sheiresa Ngo

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Your #Career : How To Wow A Job Interviewer When Changing Careers…The Trick is to Convince an Employer that your “Old” Skills/Experiences Can be Just as or even More Valuable in a New Industry or Role.

January 26, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

According to a new AARP survey, four out of 10 experienced workers will be looking for a job this year, and of those, a quarter are considering a complete career change. If you’re one of those eager to change careers in 2016, what can you do to improve your odds of success?

The trick is to convince an employer that your “old” skills and experiences can be just as — or even more — valuable in a new industry or role. Or, as my colleague Kathryn Sollmann, founder of the career advisory firm 9 Lives for Women (and an expert on women’s career change issues), puts it: “You can change industries when you connect the dots.”

The Connect the Dots Approach
I find Sollmann’s “connect the dots” approach spot-on (pardon the pun).

Once you thoroughly research your desired field, learn its lingo and identify commonalities between your previous experiences and your target employer’s needs, you’ll know which accomplishments and experiences to highlight during the interview process and on your resumé. In turn, you’ll be more likely to convince prospective hiring managers that your skills really do transfer well.

“The fact is that it’s easier for employers to settle into default mode and hire cookie-cutter candidates who all have the same background and experience. The trick is to remind employers that quick studies can learn the language of a new industry. Then through research and networking, prove you know the very specific ways your skills can be transferred to get the job done.”

In her instructive blog post detailing this “connect the dots” method, Sollmann shared the steps she took early in her career to progress from being a newly minted college grad with an English degree (aka Unemployment 101) to a job editing and writing training programs for a Big 8 accounting firm to tripling her salary in a job as a conference organizer for an investment publication.

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To summarize, Sollmann successfully made the leap between industries by doing two key things:

She thoroughly researched the specific needs of employers in her target industry.

She carefully reframed her experience in a way that proved to employers that her skills and experiences were relevant to their industry.

In other words, she made it really easy for employers to understand why they needed her.Continued from page 1

“I didn’t just say that I had the research, writing and event planning skills to do the job. I connected the dots, showing that the way I applied skills to responsibilities X, Y and Z for the training job would be applied the same way to do A, B and C in the conference-planning job,” writes Sollmann.

How to Research and Network Well

Research and networking are especially critical before you enter a job interview to change careers; they’ll help you know what to say to convince the interviewer that your seemingly inappropriate background is actually a great fit.

So I asked Sollmann how to dig up what you need to persuade an employer in another field to hire you. Here’s her advice:

Identify through LinkedIn, school alumni networks, and elsewhere a few people who work in the field you want to switch into. Then, ask for a 15-minute phone appointment with each to help you understand how you can prove that your skills are transferable.

Before you meet for this informational interview, distill your expertise into three or four major skill areas. Then, during your talk, bring up a major project or initiative you worked on that exemplified these skills and ask about parallels to the initiatives where these contacts work.

Some questions you might want to ask during your phone calls:

How is your type of expertise used where they work?
Did most of the employees “grow up” at this employer?
Does the firm or nonprofit value having employees with varying professional backgrounds and perspectives?
Can you connect me with someone who was hired from an entirely different industry so I can find out how they adapted?

Cutting Through the Cookie Cutter Mentality

If this sounds like a lot of work, well, it is. But this informational-interview research will increase your likelihood of finding appropriate job opportunities and help you make your strongest case to hiring managers.

As Sollmann concludes in her post: “The fact is that it’s easier for employers to settle into default mode and hire cookie-cutter candidates who all have the same background and experience. The trick is to remind employers that quick studies can learn the language of a new industry. Then through research and networking, prove you know the very specific ways your skills can be transferred to get the job done.”

Good luck with your career switch in 2016!

Forbes.com | January 25, 2016 | Nancy Collamer, CONTRIBUTOR

#Leadership : 5 Signs of Work Stress That You Should Never Ignore…Simply Recognizing That you’re Stressed & Taking Steps to Change your Work Environment or How you Respond to It can Be very Helpful

January 26, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

Everyone has the occasional stressful day at the office. But for some, work-related stress is a chronic problem. Sixty-five percent of Americans named work as their top source of stress, the American Psychological Association(APA) found. Eighty percent of people surveyed by Monster said they experienced the Sunday night blues, and 76% of those characterized those blues as “really bad.”

Work-related anxiety does more than just put a damper on your weekend, however. In men, chronic stress is linked to a host of health problems.

“Men under stress are more likely than women to report having been diagnosed with high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease or heart attack,” Simon A. Rego, PsyD, director of psychology training at Montefiore Medical Center/Albert Einstein College of Medicine, told Everyday Health.

Unfortunately, men may be more likely than women to ignore or downplay stress, both at work and in their personal lives.

“Men notoriously have trouble putting their feelings into words,” Edward Hallowell, author of Crazy Busy: Overstretched, Overbooked and About to Snap! Strategies for Coping in a World Gone ADD, told WebMD. “They bottle things up so they’re more subject to the damages of stress.”

Simply assuming that stress is a normal part of your work routine could also be causing you to miss your body’s attempts to warn you that the pressure is too much. If you’re experiencing any of the following symptoms, they might be due to work-related stress.

1. Frequent headaches

Frequent headaches are one of the biggest physical signs of stress, according to The American Institute of Stress. Over-the-counter pain relievers may help to relieve the occasional work-related tension headache, according tothe Cleveland Clinic, but if your headaches are chronic, you might need to explore stress management techniques, counseling, or even anti-anxiety medication or antidepressants.

Migraine headaches that happen over the weekend could also be a sign that the pressure at work is too much, since sudden decrease in stress levels may trigger these severe headaches, reported Prevention. Maintaining a consistent eating and sleeping schedule could reduce the chances you’ll experience a weekend migraine.

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2. Jaw pain

If you’re stressed, you may be clenching your jaw or grinding your teeth at night and not even realize it. Jaw pain, earaches, and headaches are all signs of bruxism, which might be caused by day-to-day stress. Practicing stress-relieving techniques like meditation might help minimize teeth clenching and grinding, as can consciously trying to relax your face during the day. If you grind your teeth at night, your dentist may tell you to wear a mouth guard to prevent damage to your teeth.

3. Upset stomach

A stressful situation at work could be the reason behind your stomachache or other gastrointestinal troubles, like constipation. That’s because “the brain and the digestive tract share many of the same nerve connections,” Douglas A. Drossman, M.D., a gastroenterologist and psychiatrist and co-director of the University of North Carolina Center for Functional GI and Motility Disorders, told Eating Well.

Altering your diet can help minimize stress-related tummy trouble. High-fiber foods like oatmeal can help regulate digestion, while fatty fish like salmon and sardines may reduce inflammation that exacerbates your stomach problems. Sugar, caffeine, alcohol, and junk food can all make your stress worse, says the Stress Management Society.

4. Breakouts and other skin problems

If your skin suddenly looks like you’re back in high school, tough times at work could be the cause. Your body’s chemical response to stress can increase breakouts, since your body is producing more cortisol, which in turn can lead to oily skin and acne flare-ups, according to WebMD. If you suffer from dry skin, eczema, psoriasis, rosacea, or other skin problems, stress can also exacerbate those conditions.

If you’re too focused on work-related troubles, you may forget to wash your face, not get enough sleep, or eat poorly, all of which can make skin problems worse. Sticking to your regular skin care regimen can help reduce breakouts, as can getting enough sleep, exercising, and drinking plenty of water.

5. Hair loss

Hair loss is a fact of life for many men, often linked to genetics, aging, or a decrease in testosterone. But if your hair is coming out in handfuls when you comb or wash it, you might have telogen effluvium, a condition that can be triggered by stress, as well as by certain medications or infections.

Occasional stress isn’t enough to cause sudden baldness, though. “Stress because you’re late to work or you’ve got a heavy workload is not going to cause you to lose hair,” dermatologist Paradi Mirmirani, MD, told WebMD. Long-term stress that causes other physical changes, like dramatic weight loss or big shifts in diet, could trigger hair loss, however. The good news is that this kind of hair loss is often temporary and may stop once you get your stress under control.

Tips for Reducing Work Stress

While you can take steps to alleviate some of the physical symptoms of stress, those remedies aren’t likely to address the underlying cause of your anxiety. Identifying stress triggers and finding ways to manage them may be the best way to reduce the headaches, stomach pains, and other stress-related problems that you’re experiencing, as well as to avoid the long-term term health problems that constant stress may cause.

Exercising, practicing meditation, creating boundaries between your job and the rest of your life, and taking time to relax and recharge can all be ways to manage work stress, says the APA. Making changes to your workspace and getting more organized at the office may also make you happier at work, since cramped and cluttered desks can exacerbate stress, according to a report in Time magazine.

Simply recognizing that you’re stressed and taking steps to change your work environment or how you respond to it can be very helpful, say experts. “People feel less stressed when they take control of a situation,” psychologist Emma Kenny told The Guardian.

CheatSheet.com | January 25, 2016 | Megan Elliott

Follow Megan on Twitter @MeganE_CS

#Leadership : Why Failure Makes You a Better Leader…Failure is Never a Positive Feeling. Nevertheless, Constantly trying to Avoid Failure is Just as Bad Because it Means you are Unlikely to Take the Risks Necessary to Achieve Success.

January 25, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

In 2016, embrace failure. It could be the point where your company makes a change for the better. How will you learn from your failures during this coming year?
Failure is never a positive feeling. Nevertheless, constantly trying to avoid failure is just as bad because it means you are unlikely to take the risks necessary to achieve success. Failure is not something to purposely seek out, but it’s certainly not something to fear if and when it does happen.

The statistics say that 90% of new businesses fail in the first five years. However, the studies say that focusing on statistics l

ike this only makes it more likely you will become a failure. Fail in the right areas and don’t obsess over setbacks.

The reality is failure does make better leaders, and here’s why.

To become a great leader in 2016 you have to be comfortable with things going wrong. Great leaders see them as learning opportunities, rather than setbacks. As long as you learn from the mistakes you make, failure is a worthwhile endeavor.

Failure Shapes Leaders

Someone who never fails either never takes risks or constantly finds a way to weasel out of responsibility. The greatest leaders in the world are shaped by failure. Take a look at tech executives, such as the co-founders of Google. They dropped out of college. Most would see that as a failure, and yet they created one of the historic companies.

The most rewarding decisions of your life will be shaped by how you react to failure.

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Resilience to Run a Business

Resilience is how people react under pressure and how they bounce back from disappointment. The only way to gain this resilience is to dare to fail. There are no leaders who are born to be leaders. This is a disservice to the men and women who are good leaders as it simply dismisses their achievements as genetics, God, or some other force out of our control.

Failure will teach you resilience and how not to buckle when you experience difficult times.

Learn What Works

The only way to achieve the success you crave is to think outside the box. Copying what someone else has done will not make your business into the organization you want. It will only take you part of the way, as all innovators have realized.

To learn what works and what doesn’t you have to test. This is the number one rule of marketing, and it’s what crucial A/B testing is based around.

If you are unwilling to fail, you will never go through this process and you will never achieve the things you want to achieve, as a result. Accepting failure will push you to try things you have never tried before and potentially win big.

Better Employee Morale

There’s nothing worse than working for someone who believes they can do no wrong. Executives like these tend to always shift the blame to a lower manager, or to simply pretend a setback never happened. It’s not a good trait to have.

Employees who see that you as a leader can fail won’t look down upon you because of it. They will see it as a positive trait. It will encourage them to try new things because they know that if it goes wrong they aren’t going to lose their jobs over it.

Some of the best corporate ideas around have come not from leaders but from the people working under them.

Of course, this is no reason to actively seek out failure. Someone who fails repeatedly without success is simply a bad leader.

Who has Your Back?

Take a startup company as an example for this section. Everyone starts working in good faith. They all love the product and they all believe they can succeed. Then a major setback happens, such as having a poor first release.

There are two sets of people at this point. One set will continue to work with the company and figure out where they went wrong. The other set will either walk out of the company or become snarky and unmotivated.

Failure has taught you who REALLY believes in what you are doing and who is going to bail when the going gets tough. You wouldn’t have known that unless something had gone wrong.

Conclusion

To become agreat leader in 2016 you have to be comfortable with things going wrong. Great leaders see them as learning opportunities, rather than setbacks. As long as you learn from the mistakes you make, failure is a worthwhile endeavor.

It will help you make the tough decisions and better appreciate your responsibilities as a leader. Countless organizations have turned themselves around simply because a big failure made them change their way of thinking.

In 2016, embrace failure. It could be the point where your company makes a change for the better. How will you learn from your failures during this coming year?

PUBLISHED ON: JAN 25, 2016

Inc.com |

BY AJ AGRAWAL

CEO, Alumnify

#Leadership : The Surprising Ways Employee Benefits Will Change in 2016…Smart Companies are Helping their Employees Worry a Little Less about Life Transitions & the Exorbitant Cost of Education.

January 25, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

When it comes to employee benefits, it’s easy to feel like nothing changes. The calendar flips to January, and you often just retain the same benefits you did the year before. You wind up feeling grateful as long as the costs don’t rise.

But in a few important ways, the benefits you’ve come to laconically accept will be changing in 2016. Bruce Elliott, manager of compensation and benefits at the Society for Human Resource Management, says the main trends pertain to worker education and family-leave time.

Whether you similarly change your own array of offerings this year or not, it’s vital to stay up on what’s coming down the pike. Not only might it help you better attract and retain top talent, you might actually get wind of cost-savings you never knew about. With this in mind, the following is a look at the latest benefits trends poised to give you something to consider in the new year.

Education and Leave

More employers will follow the lead of PricewaterhouseCoopers, says Elliott. The giant accounting firm announced last year that it would pay up to $7,200 in student debt for employees–as much as $1,200 a year for six years. He also sees companies emulating partnerships like the one Starbucks has with Arizona State University, in which Starbucks will reimburse part- or full-time employees’ pursuit of a bachelor’s degree.

As for family leave, Elliott expects companies to go the route of private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Company, which recently extended paid leave for new parents, and announced it would let employees take both their babies and their caregivers on business trips–on the company’s dime. The parent-friendly moves are part of a larger trend that began to make waves in 2015. Netflix, for example, now gives new parents unlimited maternity or paternity leave during the first year after the child’s birth or adoption. Amazon, Microsoft, and Adobe also extended their leave policies, though none went as far as Netflix.

Why is all of this happening now? Two reasons. First, notes Elliott, benefits like this help in recruiting and retaining female employees. Second, it’s election season. “The candidates on both sides of the aisle are talking about this more, and you can bet it’ll be a campaign issue later on,” he says.

Of course, large companies aren’t the only ones that need benefits to win recruiting battles. Often, it’s fast-growth, entrepreneurial companies that are on the cutting edge of new benefits offerings, since they are adding talent at a breakneck pace to keep up with the burgeoning demands for their services.

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Mobile Health

Lyft VP of people Ron Storn knows all about the pressures of adding staff quickly. At the end of 2014, the car-sharing startup had about 380 employees. Today, it has more than 700. What’s more, it’s a dispersed group of 700. Whereas the company was once based only out of its San Francisco headquarters, it’s now building offices in Nashville (customer service) and Seattle (engineering), not to mention 10 to 15 other regional offices.

When Storn thinks of benefits that will emerge in 2016, one of the first trends he thinks of is health care benefits that are mobile-friendly. For example, Lyft is partnering with a company called One Medical Group, a provider of technology-enabled primary care. The partnership gives Lyft employees 24/7 access via mobile app to a virtual care team, which can help them treat allergies and renew prescriptions without an office visit. One Medical also offers same-day appointments with doctors in more than 40 cities. A benefit like that is ideal for Lyft, Storn says, because there are so many employees who are either traveling or new to a particular city. “It’s great for our employees because of the convenience,” he says. “They can go to a new city and have fewer distractions, not worrying about what doctors to see.”

Mind and Body Fitness

Joris Luijke, VP of people at Grovo, is another human resources expert who knows all about recruiting and retaining in fast-growth environments. Grovo, which is based in New York City, creates employee-training videos for clients like Sotheby’s and SurveyMonkey. It has 190 employees, raised $15 million last year, and has raised more than $20 million overall. Mind you, Luijke has only been at Grovo for three months. But he was previously vice president of human resources at Squarespace, which has raised more than $80 million. Before that, he was vice president of talent at Atlassian, which had one of the strongest IPOs of 2015 ($460 million). So he knows what it’s like to compete for high-stakes talent.

Ask Luijke about benefits you’re likely to see more of in 2016, and the first thing he speaks about is a new, more specialized focus on employee fitness and emotional well being. For example, a standard fitness benefit might be something like reimbursement for a gym membership. But Luijke sees companies making a focal point of fitness–going out of their way to make sure a stressful, full-time job doesn’t come at the expense of exercise and eating right.

Grovo, for example, employs a full-time personal trainer. Employees can sign up for one-on-one advisory sessions with him, or simply take his classes at the in-office company gym. The company also has a dedicated nap room for relaxing, meditating, or actually napping. “There’s this real movement to making emotional and physical health more of an explicit part of the employee benefits,” he says. Luijke further makes the case that your company will see a lasting ROI if you make a large investment in the health of your employees.

Flexible Hours

When it comes to family leave, he also sees a trend in which employers do more than just provide paid time off. Like KKR, which pays for employees to take their babies and their caregivers on business trips, Luijke envisions a benefits scenario in which companies become more thoughtful about employee reintegration into the workplace, after an extended time away. One possible solution he foresees is simply allowing employees to work three or four days a week before returning to full-time schedules.

If, after reading all this, you find yourself wondering what steps to take to attract talent with novel twists on your benefits, both Luijke and Storn have some straightforward advice: Ask your employees. Survey them. Talk to them. Do it regularly. Lyft, for example, found out about One Medical because a handful of employees were using it on their own anyway. After learning about it from employee surveys, Storn became convinced that it was the right thing for the growing company to do.

PUBLISHED ON: JAN 25, 2016

You #Career : Four Job Search Mistakes College Students Should Stop Making Immediately…The Pressure to Nail Down a Summer Gig starts Early in the Spring Semester. The Best Opportunities often Appear during the Doldrums of Winter & Vanish Quickly.

January 25, 2016/in First Sun Blog/by First Sun Team

If you’re a college student, For seniors, this final semester brings a blend of relief, nostalgia and, I can imagine, creeping anxiety about how to pay back those tens of thousands in student loans. As someone still young enough to remember my college days and the anxiety-filled post-graduation job hunt, but advanced enough that I’m now reviewing resumes from eager young students and about-to-be-graduates,

I’ve been taking careful note of the common mistakes I’m seeing from entry-level job seekers and would-be interns. Here are four of the top blunders to avoid:

Guessing vs. playing it safe.

When you’re taking a multiple choice final and come across a question you don’t know the answer to, conventional wisdom says you should guess. By leaving it blank, you’re guaranteed zero points, but with a shot-in-the-dark guess amongst A,B,C and D, you have a 25% chance of being correct. This logic shouldn’t apply to your job hunt. If the posting asks you to email your resume and cover letter toasmith@company.com, incorrectly guessing that the A stands for Alan and not Abby and addressing your letter to ‘Dear Mr. Smith’ (I’ve seen it done) is an easy way to look like you don’t care about details. Comb LinkedIn for all the A. Smiths who work at the company to find the right one. If that doesn’t yield results, “Dear Hiring Manager” is still preferably to being presumptuous.

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Focusing on the wrong achievements.

The types of accomplishments that got you into a good college are not necessarily the ones that will land you a good job. Putting your four years of varsity cheerleading ahead of your internships is not the path to success. Include only those extracurriculars that you can reasonably tie to the skills and experience the job posting is asking for or that are extraordinarily impressive. Admissions officers care if you’re well-rounded, employers much less so.

Assuming a B effort will yield A results.

Being the best of a subpar bunch is not a bad place to be if your biochemistry professor grades on a curve. Unfortunately, for you, most employers don’t. You’re not just competing with other applicants, you’re competing against all the other choices the hiring manager has for getting the chunk of work done that the job description represents. There are few fields with such a labor shortage that companies will willingly hire a mediocre candidate because he or she is less mediocre than the other applicants. Instead, I’ve seen company leave a job posting up for months, outsource to freelancers, reassign job duties to cover the required tasks or simply do without. If a company wants to hire an A employees, they’re unlikely to settle for a B among a sea of Cs.

Saying too much

To the surprise of no one, young people who grew up in the TMI era often lack an intellectual filter when it comes to parsing which of their personal stories are fit for public consumption. See this Frank Bruni piece from 2014 on oversharing in college admissions essays for some choice examples. Youthful TMI or braggadocio isn’t just for admissions essays, as my piece on the world’s worst cover letter (penned by a would-be Wall Street intern) shows. Heed its lessons.

Employers don’t expect you to have a wealth of experience at your age. Instead, they’re looking for growth potential and good judgment. Demonstrate both by keeping your application materials succinct (you don’t need a three-page resume and a 1000-word cover letter), professional in tone and devoid of all references to your squat weight. Put another way, if there’s significant overlap between your Tinder bio, your resume and your new therapist’s intake form, re-think your choices.

Learn more about my work and connect with me on Twitter.

Forbes.com | January 25, 2016 | J. Maureen Henderson